Paddle fans or ceiling lighting fixtures are often mounted to a bracket across a box attached to a stud in the ceiling. These bracket mounts are less than stable for the ceiling lighting fixture, making loosening and/or falling of the fixture within the realm of possibility, especially for heavy paddle fans.
Existing electrical work boxes are described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,424,406 of Slater and U.S. Pat. No. 4,436,952 of Lockwood.
Lockwood '952 describes a work box with a conventional accessory screw holding bracket protruding up from the surface of one of the walls of the work box. The protruding bracket interferes with the flush placement of the work box within a hole within a wall corresponding in shape to the exterior of the work box.
Slater '406 describes a work box in general but is silent about a mounting means for the work box.
Cylindrical work boxes with bent attachment tabs are described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,857,581 of Jorgensen, but Jorgensen '581 is not useful for heavy duty paddle fan installations.
An improvement in electrical work boxes is shown in Applicant's U.S. Pat. No. 5,600,093 of Herth and Davis, which describes an electrical work box for new work and old work, wherein a novel interior attachment is described for vertically attaching the electrical work box to a building stud via an angled screw mount within the electrical work box.
However, Herth and Davis '093 does not describe a round ceiling mounted box which can be mounted to a ceiling stud to firmly suspend a ceiling lighting fixture or smoke/carbon monoxide alarm device therefrom.